Sunday, February 02, 2014

Q: It's a two-part question: Where in most homes will you see the words SHE and HIS, and what word will you see right after HIS?

We don't even have these words in our home. If we did, we would use the word after HIS. Anyone think the word OUR might also be next to these two? Good, I thought so.

Edit: The initial answer I came up with was SHErry and wHISkey being in a locked cabinet requiring a key. I hinted at bOURbon (with another clue toward bon=good). But I wasn't completely satisfied with the answer. I'm leaning toward the alternate answer provide by Al in the comments as Will's intended answer.

A: A digital clock with the times viewed upside down as letters. 3:45 is SHE, 5:14 is HIS. The time that follows immediately after is 5:15 which spells SIS.

139 comments:

Here's my standard reminder... don't post the answer or any hints that could lead directly to the answer (e.g. via a chain of thought, or an internet search) before the deadline of Thursday at 3pm ET. If you know the answer, click the link and submit it to NPR, but don't give it away here.

You may provide indirect hints to the answer to show you know it, but make sure they don't give the answer away. You can openly discuss your hints and the answer after the Thursday deadline. Thank you.

At the end of last week’s thread I posted something like:“If the answer I have come up with is the Presumed Intended Answer (the PIA, a.k.a. “the Zadora“), I believe the wording to this puzzle is somewhat misleading. (No hint, just a comment)”

That said, the “where in most homes” and “the word … right after HIS” can have a connection. That’s a nice twist and bit of elegance, but you still have to get past what I deem misleading.

Hint: Ol’ Dobbin might have better luck solving this puzzle (and those below) than the folks in the carriage holding his reins.

Two similar puzzles:1. In what section of the newspaper would you see the words HIS and HERS, and what word would you see right after HIS?2. Where in most homes will you see the words HIP, HOP and RAP? (Also PURE, RUSH, REAM, RAT, RED, RATE, RIND, LEND, ASH, END and EAT)LegoLambdad...

WW:You recently told me you were "positive," and now you are telling us you are "sure." Well don't be so certain. I would never be caught watching a football game, no matter what. I see football as symptomatic and a microcosm of most of what I despise about this country. Instead I intend to take advantage of the weather and go for a bike ride. Your team can win for all I care. At least then I won't have to hear cars honking their horns all evening. :-)

Perhaps (without revealing too much), someone on the blog could resolve a disagreement among our family members about the intent of this puzzle. SHE thinks Will is asking for a sequence of three consecutive (written) words (“SHE”, “HIS” plus one other word) each standing along with no intervening words or letters. HIS interpretation is that the letters “S,H,E,H,I and S” must appear in sequence but may be parts of other words as in the phrase “Is he Hispanic?” And the DOG, (if I’m interpreting her comments correctly) says that the letters “S,H,E,H,I and S” can be embedded in a word or phrase, must occur in the given order, but need not be consecutive.Sheesh!

Lorenzo,Hate to be sexist but I’m more on board with HIS interpretation over the one SHE or your German SHEpherd harbor, at least accoring to my interpretation of Will’s/Sam Williamson’s words. (I’m more on board with your “HISpanic,” less on board with your “iS HE…”)Lego…

Agree there are likely multiple correct answers, which is befitting a puzzle posted on Groundhog Day. Agree there are likely multiple correct answers, which is befitting a puzzle posted on Groundhog Day.

I agree with Word Woman that the puzzle could have been crafted in a better way, but I stick by my guns and am fairly certain that the answer has been divulged, or might I say "uncorked." Even Blaine's introductory clue clearly points to this solution. Take another look at the wording. Will did not state that MOST homes have these items (my current residence clearly does not--these Mormon jails are the worst!), rather he seems to be implying (albeit unclearly) that in most homes that DO indeed have these items, they will be found in a specific location. At this point, however, the giveaway clue (i.e., solution) has been left in place for so long that Blaine finds himself in a situation where if he were to remove it, everyone would know for certain that it was the probable solution. I rest my CASE (pun intended). On a related side note, the warden here at Draper compensates snitches with a lollipop. He keeps them under lock and key in his licker cabinet (of course).

AbqG,Do you think it wise to post here about plotting your escape? What if the warden, or one of his/her henchmen/henchwomen is a Blainesville blogger or peruser? Many here on this blog have proven to be veritable yeggs when it comes to cracking Will’s conundrums. Perhaps some of us are professional turkeys…, oops, I meant turnkeys!

The only answer to this HisShe puzzle that I have found is the “uncorked” one to which you allude. Is there another possible answer out there somewhere? If so, have there been hints to it that I have missed?LeyeggoLambda

Andy got paroled this past week, so I got a new cellie on Thursday. I heard the guard's key in the lock and when I rolled over to have a look-see, the door opened and this inmate walked in. The guy was huge. Looked a lot like John Lee Hooker. A real sour puss. The first words out of his mouth were, "Make Room for Daddy!" (Yikes!) He carried only his books and his cassette deck. Turns out he has only a single Frankie Valli tape that he plays over and over. What I wouldn't give for a few of my early Willie Nelson cassettes. If I'd known when I went up the river that music was allowed, I woulda brought me some. Have a swell week everyone! We get to hear the game on the radio! Yay!7 clues from GuerrillaBoy

Lorenzo,Yes, at least no “scrunching” is involved in my PIA (Presumed Intended Answer), although some posts subsequent to yours are making me question whether my solution really is Will’s intended answer.

My wife finally convinced me to give up and go with the answer that people seem to be hinting at (or posting in plain sight), despite the lameness of that answer, and the laxness on the part of our moderator it implies.

It happens that Sam Williamson of Charlevoix, Mich, is a sailor. I wonder how he swears?

Other countries, such as in the United Kingdom, spell it, WHISKY, without the E.

I am not a Sherry fan, although I would not turn down a glass of Osborne’s Amontillado, and that’s no toro. My preferences lie just to the West of Spain, in Portugal where Port is made. Why drink Sherry when Port is available?

It is hard to tell if Will is expecting us to also submit Liquor Cabinet in our answers, but I am assuming he only meant the bottles. In any case my experience is that not many people have these cabinets, but either keep liquor and wine in a cupboard or, more likely, on display on top of a piece of furniture, ready for action.

The DICTIONARY is the place in my home where these two words (she & his) are found and the word after “his” in my dictionary is HISPANIC!

I do believe that a dictionary is more common in homes than BOTH sherry & whiskey. I do not, however, believe a dictionary can be found “in most homes.” Will needs to do better research about what can be found “in most homes.” I cannot find any statistics on the percentage of U.S. homes possessing a dictionary. Can someone here do better?

MyVINDICATORY statement was my clue. Remove the V from “vindicatory” and rearrange the remaining letters to form “dictionary.”

I am still amazed that Bob K.'s post about dictionaries was allowed to stand and also Lorenzo's post “Is he Hispanic?” as both posts appeared to me to be near total giveaways.

Ron,I feel your pain. I too thought dictionary would work and was going to say something corny about being in a panic but then saw the unchallenged post and said "uh-oh". At one point the sherry (Sherry Baby) crossed my mind but whiskey never did (I prefer wines any way). I was all around key and hook but never quite got it

Jeepers, what an awful puzzle. I keep thinking that surely the answer can't be SHERRY and WHISKEY. I don't imagine you'd find whiskey in most homes, and certainly not sherry. But really, that's the best that can be done? Rats. ---Rob

If sherry & whiskey is the answer, the blog administrator should have removed my post. I just don't believe that BOTH sherry & whiskey can be found "in most homes." They BOTH must be found in homes for the answer to work.

I keep thinking that _maybe_ someone has come up with a better answer, but it doesn't look as if that is happening. _Maybe_ Will will surprise us all on Sunday by posting an appropriate answer we have all overlooked. I certainly hope so.---Rob

See, now this is clever. I nominate this as the correct answer, no matter what Mr. Shortz says on Sunday. (And it'd better not be the dictionary or liquor names; that's just stupid. The answer could just as well be "the kitchen" and "cat food" if your kitchen contains brand-name products like Hershey's and Whiskas. (Bonus: in this case, the word preceding "she" is "her.") Too easy to come up with a myriad of answers that are equally "correct.")

I wrote: I believe the wording to this puzzle is somewhat misleading. “Where in most homes will you see the words SHE and HIM?” If the words are whiskey and sherry, the word “most” is suspect. Should go with the safer “many.”

Also, it is misleading to call a part of a word, such as HIS within wHISkey, a word, I contend. “His” is a word only if the W, K, E and Y are whisked away, otherwise it is only three letters that go into forming the word “whiskey.”

Thus my “Hint: Ol’ Dobbin might have better luck solving this puzzle (and those below) than the folks in the carriage holding his reins.” Dobbin wears blinders, so would see only the “HIS” not the peripheral “W” and “KEY.”

The “where in most homes” (LIQUOR CABINET) and “the word … right after HIS” (KEY) can have a connection. (Some liquor cabinets require keys to open.)

My two puzzles similar to Will’s this week (which I could have worded better also!)

1. In what section of the newspaper would (I should have used “might”) you see the words HIS and HERS, and what word would you see right after HIS?Answer: the sports section, with its professional team standings/results.The NBA’s MempHIS GRIZZLES. The NFL’s Carolina PantHERS.

2. Where in most (should have used “many”) homes will (should have used “might”) you see the words HIP, HOP and RAP? (Also PURE, RUSH, REAM, RAT, RED, RATE, RIND, LEND, ASH, END and EAT)On a blender: wHIP, cHOP, fRAPpe… PUREe, cRUSH, cREAM, gRATe. GRATE, gRIND, bLEND, mASH, blEND and bEAT.If a participant/reader of this blog “gets the call,” weigh in to let us know what your answer was.

I doff my thinking cap to Al. As Planned Chaos astutely noted, if this is not the intended answer, it should be. Excellent solving, Al!

(Now I will assume that Al’s solution is indeed Will’s intended answer.): My cap is now also off to Will and, especially, to Sam Williamson, the puzzle constructor. TomR described this solution as “mildly clever. But I would go so far as to describe the 3:45, 5:14, 5:15 solution as really clever, approaching genius. It sure fooled me, anyway.

And “SIS, which passes the Merriam Webster and Scrabble tests, is “seen right after HIS” not spatially, but chronologically. That’s pretty darn good misdirection. Who knows, perhaps, Sam Williamson and/or Will were aware of the SHErry, wHIS-KEY red herring. If so, I would be really impressed.

(As for the inverted aspect of the answer, yeah, that’s an issue, but no more so than the whole word-within-a-word quibble I had with whiskey and sherry. ShE, hIS and SIS, do exist on, say, a digital clock. Maybe it’s in a house filled with gravity-boots aficionados.)

I suspect many on this blog may be similar to me in the following respect: Low self-esteem is a non-issue. My ego is way too big for its britches. My pride can always stand being taken down a few notches, and the belt girding my pudgy ego taken in a few notches. Please pass me a slice of diet humble pie, with just a smidge of whipped cream to make it go down easier.

My answer: Most homes have a Bible. Even Jewish and Muslim homes have the Old Testament. The words "SHE" and "HIS" are found in many places there.

The first occurrence of HIS is in Genesis 1, verse 27: "So God created man in HIS OWN image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them." -- The word following HIS here is OWN.

The first two occurrences of SHE is in Genesis 2, verse 23: "Then the man said, 'This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; SHE shall be called Woman, because SHE was taken out of Man.' "

Well, I'm disappointed. I was hoping to surf over here today and find out the *real* answer to this puzzle. It certainly wouldn't be "the dictionary", 'cause that would just be stupid. There are a lot of books that contain the words "she" and "his". Not real thrilled about the Sherry and Whiskey answer either. I mean, seriously, how many people have Sherry or Whiskey in their homes? I don't (but I do have koSHEr dill pickles and herSHEy's syrup). Either we all missed the answer or this is a really feeble puzzle. Guess we'll find out on Sunday.

When my chocoholic mapping partner and his wife had a baby, he passed out HERSHEY bars that were attached to a paper saying "It's a" followed by the chocolate bar with a cut-out sleeve so it could read HE or SHE. Paul, ever the planner, determined he could change the sleeves further to make HE and SHE, HER and SHE, and HE and HE for the various twin options. Never got to the triplet options. . .

Blaine, are you there? I'd like to know what you believe the correct answer is. If you're agreeing that the location was the bar or liquor cabinet within the words SHErry and wHISkey and the word following HIS being KEY, then I must ask you this: Didn't you notice that:

I wasn't 100% sure that sherry & whiskey were the intended answers. There was another comment before those that mentioned "whiskey" and I almost deleted it. Then when I saw benmar's post along with his saying that there might be other answers, I figured that either he was right and sherry/whiskey was not the answer, or it was too late anyway as the cat was out of the bag.

In reading Al's answer of a digital clock, it fits the clues much better and I think that is the intended answer. So I stand by not having deleted what appeared to be a blatant giveaway.

Yes, I think we all had a nagging doubt about our answers. Al's digital clock answer fits much better and is clever. Kudos! My note to Will would be to say "many" rather than "most," and U. S. homes rather than homes (if that is his intended population).

INTERPRETATION OF CLUES:Andy got paroled this past week, so I got a new cellie on Thursday. I heard the guard's key (#1 KEY) in the lock and when I rolled over to have a look-see, the door opened and this inmate walked in. The guy was huge. Looked a lot like John Lee Hooker (#2 JLH song: Whiskey & Wimmin). A real sour (#3 Whiskey Sour) puss. The first words out of his mouth were, "Make Room for Daddy!" (#4 Sherry Jackson played Danny's daughter) (Yikes!) He carried only his books and his cassette deck. Turns out he has only a single Frankie Valli tape that he plays over and over (#5 Sherry by 4 Seasons). What I wouldn't give for a few of my early Willie Nelson cassettes. If I'd known when I went up the river (#6 WN's "Whiskey River Take Me Home") that music was allowed, I woulda brought me some.

Here is my take on the situation. I think there are up to 3 possible answers to this puzzle that will satisfy some, but not all, of us. I think we will end up not agreeing on which answer is more appropriate. I think this is a substandard puzzle with dubious answers. I prefer the whiskey & sherry answer over the others. The dictionary comes in next and I would agree that the digital clock answer would be best if it did not require turning the clock upside down. For me that is just way too bogus. Come to my house and you would have no trouble locating the words in numerous dictionaries and also a whiskey bottle and a bottle of Spanish Sherry vinegar that I use to make salad dressing. Will can do much better than this pathetic offering, but chooses not to for whatever reason I do not know.

sdb and David,I respect your takes on Al‘s solution, but respectfully disagree. (zeke, I realize you be kinda joshin’ us with your colon comment.)

As to sdb’s objection about inversion and David’s point # 2, even if a word is upside-down, it still exists. It is possible for some people to read a book upside-down, for example. If you look at a U.S. map upside-down, the words Seattle, Utah, Denver and Georgia are all there, just harder to read. (I was just joshing, zeke-like, with my comment in an earlier post about “gravity boots.”)

As to David’s point # 1, I would contend that the “where in most homes” need not be a room; it might be a grandfather clock, calendar, washer/dryer, vacuum cleaner, microwave oven or, as in the puzzle I composed early this week, a blender. Such “things,” I believe, are legitimate “wheres.” Therefore, my mileage varies ;-).

This week has been interesting. Many of us were giving hints to a presumed answer that we thought stunk, while the real answer might have been, for many of us, right under our noses as we scratched our heads! We cannot complain, as we often do, that this puzzle was too easy. Indeed, as far as I can tell, Al is the only one of us who got it right, which leads to the following speculation: Will this puzzle set a record for the fewest correct entries?

Al, did you submit your answer? Get the call? Will Will gloat on Sunday? Will he say “Many people submitted ‘sherry and whiskey in a liquor cabinet,’ but that doesn’t work, of course, because you won’t find liquor cabinets in most homes.”

Thanks again to WW for her “heads-up” on my David/Chuck name mix-up. Just for the record, I have reposted below how the post should have appeared:

sdb, Chuck and David,I respect your takes on Al‘s solution. I agree with David’s take but respectfully disagree with sdb and Chuck. (zeke, I realize you be kinda joshin’ us with your colon comment.)

As to sdb’s objection about inversion and Chuck’s point # 2, even if a word is upside-down, it still exists. It is possible for some people to read a book upside-down, for example. If you look at a U.S. map upside-down, the words Seattle, Utah, Denver and Georgia are all there, just harder to read. (I was just joshing, zeke-like, with my comment in an earlier post about “gravity boots.”)

As to Chuck’s point # 1, I would contend that the “where in most homes” need not be a room; it might be a grandfather clock, calendar, washer/dryer, vacuum cleaner, microwave oven or, as in the puzzle I composed early this week, a blender. Such “things,” I believe, are legitimate “wheres.” Therefore, I guess my mileage varies ;-).

This week has been interesting. Many of us were giving hints to a presumed answer that we thought stunk, while the real answer might have been, for many of us, right under our noses as we scratched our heads! We cannot complain, as we often do, that this puzzle was too easy. Indeed, as far as I can tell, Al is the only one of us who got it right, which leads to the following speculation: Will this puzzle set a record for the fewest correct entries?

Al, did you submit your answer? Get the call? Will Will gloat on Sunday? Will he say “Many people submitted ‘sherry and whiskey in a liquor cabinet,’ but that doesn’t work, of course, because you won’t find liquor cabinets in most homes.”

Next week's challenge: This week's challenge comes from listener Steve Baggish of Arlington, Mass. Name a title character from a classic work of fiction, in 8 letters. Change the third letter to an M. The result will be two consecutive words naming parts of the human body. Who is the character, and what parts of the body are these?